Camping World continues to acquire more and more RV dealers on its “march on to world dominance.” Just a few of the RV dealers recently purchased or being purchased by Camping World include Roy Robinson RV, Travel Land RV Center, Halterman’s RV, Breeden RV Center, Carbon Emery RV, All Seasons RV, and Funtime RV, among others.
In some markets, Camping World has now acquired a fourth and possibly upwards of a third of the RV dealers that regularly exhibit at local RV shows.
This begs the question of what will happen to local RV shows when “King Marcus” invokes his policy of not supporting them?
A smaller regional RV show that traditionally has eight local dealers exhibiting decreases to six. In larger markets, you may have a show with 12 dealers that regularly exhibit pared down to nine.
What are the consequences of losing 25–33 percent of the local dealers exhibiting at an RV show?
- Fewer exhibiting RV dealers equates to fewer RVs for the attending public to compare.
- Fewer RV dealers means less income for the show promoters to cover their expenses. Those include renting the venue, advertising, hiring seminar speakers, paying staff, and much more. Their only choice to stay afloat is to raise prices for their exhibitors (RV dealers) and attendees (ticket admission prices).
- RV show attendees are less likely to attend the shows as they realize: Why pay more to attend the show to see fewer RVs than they were able to see in the past when there were more dealers?
- The show might hang on for a few more years until Camping World drives out one or two of the competing RV dealers in the market or acquires them.
- Collateral damage will be the nonprofit show associations that produce RV shows for the benefit of the public and the industry. Many of these associations use the proceeds of their RV shows for training local RV technicians, investing in vocation programs and donating to other non-profit organizations that support outdoor recreation.
My guess is that once enough local multiple-dealer RV shows have been defeated, we will see more of Camping World’s ‘Ultimate RV Show’ productions pop up in their place. Of course, at these “shows” there will be no way to determine if you are getting a good price on an RV as there won’t be any competition among dealers. “Peasant” RV dealers that aren’t part of the Camping World “kingdom royalty” won’t be allowed to exhibit at these shows.
What are your thoughts? Will local RV shows survive? Please share using the comment box below.
Dave will be speaking at the 2023 America’s Largest RV Show in Hershey, PA, September 13th – 17th. He would love to meet RVtravel.com readers that will be attending. Feel free to introduce yourself after one of his seminars.
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How sad and maddening.
Since “King Marcus” stated that any supporters of Trump were not welcome in his business’, I pledged to never purchase anything from “King Marcus” businesses. I would stop RV’ing if it meant buying an RV from Campworld.
No_TDS. — No Marcus Lemonis did not say that. He was misquoted and then social media picked it up and the rest is history. Marcus had not yet learned his lesson to watch his words carefully when talking to the media, knowing that they could be twisted. I am not a fan of Mr. Lemonis, but he got a raw deal with this never-ending misquote.
Chuck, I actually saw the interview. ML did clearly Quote his Disdane for Trump and his Supporters. I can personally send you the link to the interview.
Send me the interview then BNS. As I recall he said something regarding the race protests in Charlotte and it got twisted. Please send me the interview then, so I can confirm whether I am right or wrong. I don’t want to be spreading misinformation. You can email me at chuck (at) RVtravel.com .
The only thing I saw from the race protests in Charlotte that got twisted Chuck was what Trump said, when the MSM cherry picked a portion of 2 sentences from Trumps speech, leaving out all of the contextulization of the sentences, in an effort to falsely make all MAGA and everything Trump into rascists. Context.
I couldn’t agree more with you on disinformation Chuck. In today’s issue, the trivia piece was a good example of something needing context.
Iam sorry, Chuck. Your Wrong! I can send you the link to the Interview. ML clearly stated his Disdane for Trump and his Supporters.
If Chuck will allow (if it’s even retrievable) the link of the untouched interview to be available so the unvarnished truth is finally out. I sure would would like to watch it here, unfiltered so every reader of RVTravel can approve or not. It may be relevant material for 99% of the readers.
I hope you have access to it and can get it off to Chuck. I would like to know, 1 way or the other.
Here’s a prophetic example of how large companies differ from local businesses… https://kfor.com/news/local/frustrating-okc-camping-world-hit-by-vandals-customers-and-business-lose-1000s/
May be just one incident, and such things do happen no matter how responsible the business is with their security, though it is telling on how the one customer (victim) in the article was notified….
…and how he had already been waiting two months for a $200 repair?
I guess most newbies won’t understand this. On the other hand so many who decide to purchase their RVs do their preliminary research online. I did and then visited dealers directly. Eventually, I settled on airstream product. One of the reasons is I have heard so many horror stories and RV dealerships in general, that I wanted to avoid them. And the airstream dealership in my area discounted a small amount, provided attractive financing options, and great warranties and follow up service. I’m very happy with my Airstream Atlas purchase and the dealership. The only issue that makes me sad is that Airstream is now owned by Thor. Thor, in the manner of Camping World, has been buying up RV manufacturers. This could be the subject of another of your articles.
Camping World is already too expensive on RVs, so if they buy up everybody else then none of us will be buying RVs anymore. I will not pay the outrageous price that they get for RVs, I will go without. Most of the RVs out there are junk anyway they’re built worse than a mobile home.
Honestly after company ceo came out against conservatives years ago I permanently took camping world off my list.
Quality issues have become such an issue I am not buying. We need lemon laws for RVs also.
I thought there were laws in place to keep from having a monopoly in any segment of commerce.
CW will be the demise of the RV industry if people continue to be suckered into their BS sales, warranty workless, questionable sales reputation, and continued over taking smaller dealers. As far as I look at CW, they are the Walmart of the RV world. NO ONE should do ANY BUSINESS with them and RV’ers past, current, and potential buyers should take their business elsewhere. ONLY future RV owners can bring down the monopoly CW has become and not soon enough!
Camping world built a new store from ground up in Green Bay Wisconsin absolutely empty nothing, nada. Built one in Oshkosh Wisconsin. Same thing whats the deal?
They built one in Onalaska as well & it is sitting empty. Interesting business strategy?? I join the many others who will not do business with CW, I will work with the local dealerships as long as possible.
He’ll dictate the purchase price for RV manuf and drive a few of them out of business, too many now as is. But employment in Elkhart will drop over the next 5 yrs for sure. Camping world will have a greater share of a smaller pie. ATT did it, GM did it, banks did it. Doesn’t work out well in long term…
All businesses ebb and flow. The higher they climb, the farther they have to fall. Camping World may do a lot of damage before they eventually crumble. RVs aren’t quite ready to be sold the Carvana way, however some sort of innovation will emerge or CW will get fat and lazy. Sears and K-Mart and Blockbuster and Circuit City are all variations on the theme. The question here is one of the valid points – what fallout will there be?
Looking at my Camping world stock, down about .2%
Closed today 28.07. Thor closed $95.47
My friend bought one of their trailers and had some problems. They never came to fix them. Brand new trailer barely two months old and under warranty. I wouldn’t suggest this place.
Camping World is terrible. It is sad that they are being allowed to take over so much of the industry. I patronize the store but I would never, ever buy an rv from them. The one time we tried, we ended up walking out in the middle of the sales manager’s spiel. They chased us onto the parking lot. It was pretty bad.
On my 4th trailer and bought this through Camping World. Didn’t want to buy the only place around here with that make and model. Now I’m excellent at buying and buying cars. I’ve heard the horror stories about the uneducated who buy from them and get screwed so I was ready.
They did not disappoint. They are an absolute high pressure machine that will just devour buyers. I did my homework, already ran the numbers, know what my trade was listed at on NADA, etc. They offered me half of the trade in value, wanted 20% down, and the payment was mathematically so far off that even they couldn’t explain it. In the end, I got absolutely everything I demanded and literally just caved in because they knew they couldn’t win with me.
After that experience, it’s so obvious why they have such a terrible reputation. Now I’m dealing with a warranty repair through them and it’s not disappointing either.
We did the same. They tried and tried but in the end I got exactly what I wanted for my trade plus they sold me my 5th for the advertised show price. Then tried to hit me with a high interest rate even though I’m 800+ score. They finally came down to a going rate. They did however win on the cost of a 2nd a/c installation. That was over a thousand bucks that I thought I had included in the deal. I guess I missed that while reading everything. So they got me on that. My fault.
Oh great. More RV dealers that will overcharge their customers for poor quality, slapped together RVs and then provide horrible customer service after the sale.
Yes Marcus needs to be stopped, I would not buy an rv from him. Crappie service and he don’t care about people. I find him to be an arrogant twit.
I give them 1-4 years. The RV market is tanking and the used market is getting busy and prices are dropping. If they have loaned money or have to pay for theses acquisitions, the market will deal with Camping World. Frankly they could very well be doomed due to what I have seen as a horrible reputation.
Just Say “No” to Marcus Lemonis and “Camping World”…… (Sorry To The Employees)